Erwan Le Corre | The Tyler Wagner Show #1081

Hello everyone. Welcome back to another episode. Really excited for this one today. We have Erwan Lecourt with us. So welcome to the show, man.

Hi Tyler. Thanks. Thank you for having me.

I know, grateful to have you on. So yeah, if you can just start us off a little bit more about you and what you do.

I'm known for what's called Move Nat or the idea of natural movement. I'm We teach people how to move naturally. So what this means for human beings is crawling, hanging, and jumping, balancing, running, all the movements that we used to do spontaneously when we were kids. And then we're, we're said, don't, don't, don't do that. And when you think of how a, how would you train a wild tiger or an eagle or dolphin or wild animals to be fit, to become fit in the first place and then to stay fit. And that would make no sense to send them into a gym for, you know, isolate the muscles for strength and then go on an elliptical for cardio and maybe add some stretching to that. So if it seems a little weird for thinking of wild animals to do that, what about us? We do have all these options of of fitness programs to get fit in many ways. But let's not forget that originally we did have a program in us. We can remember it when we're kids. That's about real world physical capability to be capable to operate our own body in the real world. And we need real movements in real environments. So that's what we teach as a method. It's as a fitness program. So it's called Move Nat and Natural Movement. I've been known for doing that since 2009. Now we have a team, we have workshops around the world, we have certifications. Men's Health called me a fitness visionary back in 2009 when I had a feature-length article, 11 pages, 16 photos in, in 2009. And I burst on that fitness scene out of nowhere because I— nobody knew me, and what I did was completely new. And I'm also now known for holding my breath a very long time. So that's something else. Oh, really?

How long?

Um, the, the, the national US record that I established under the CMAS rules, because there's another organization, uh, recently was 7 minutes and 8 seconds, but my personal best is 8 minutes, 3 seconds.

Holy crap, dude.

I teach that too as a meditation, because the thing is, you bet that it's not just a mind over matter or just a matter of willpower. It's part of it, but, um, or physiological adaptation. It's part of it, but most importantly, it's a meditation. In other words, unless you master your mind and the experience your mind is going through during that whole time. And 8 minutes watching a show is nothing, but 8 minutes or several minutes holding your breath, it can feel like a very long time. But my students, they double, triple, or quadruple their original breath hold time before instruction and after instruction in record time of just 4 weeks, and or less than that, as a matter of fact. And the answer is not found in, oh, my body adapted to it. No, you learn to operate your mind in a completely different way.

All right, so I got like 8 questions in my mind now. I gotta pick which one I want to ask first. Um, let me— I'm gonna actually start general and then I'll go into more detail. So if I were to— this is like a very— so it might— oh, here, I'll just ask. So like, if somebody were to ask you, how do I master my mind? How would you, how would you answer that?

Oh, the question number one is, what do you want to experience?

All right, so it would be like a custom thing per person.

Yes or no? Yes, it's, it can be individualized, but at the same time So what is mastering the mind? What for? What is the mind? So, questions, and then we're gonna go like, like, whoa, where is this going? Why would you want to master your mind? What's wrong with your mind? What's wrong with— why would— why you not fully satisfied with the way you operate and experience the mind that you are now? What is it that's missing? What is it that you think is like not exactly what I would like. Maybe I'm, I'm too often lacking clarity or lacking focus, or I'm frustrated, or typically. So we're going to look at, okay, there's those parts of my experience within my mind, something nobody else can see or experience for you, right? Only you know exactly what you experience in your mind, even when you put— sometimes you project something else. But let's say if you're sad, if you're depressed, All the things negative. You may show something else you're not showing because that's not what you want to show, or you have somehow some form of modesty about what's going on in your mind. I'm talking really real here.

Yeah.

And you're like, I want to change that, so I want a different experience. So you're going to want that different experience. How are you going to manifest that experience. Well, so how do you master your mind? Well, you need to have an intention, number one. You have to be very clear about the kind of experience you want to have, but that experience that you want to have is an experience that you're going to be in the moment. You're not just having an experience, you're being that experience. So first off is What is the experience that you want to be? And in what context? In what context? So, because the mind is an experience, but it's never exactly the same experience. So you have to have an intention, a clarity about how does it, how does that experience feel? How does it manifest? Because it's the mind. So how does it manifest? Thoughts? Images, visualization, feelings. So what is that? What is it that you want to experience? Number one. Yeah. Then you can think about why. What's your drive here? What— why is it that you want it? And then we can talk about the how. And of course, the how is very important.

Got it. Now, real quick, before we get to that, is, um, and I'll, I'll ask you the question you brought up. If you— if If you were to describe what the mind is, how would you describe that? I'm glad you said that. That's interesting. I've never really thought about— I've always thought about it this way. I think it's interesting, like the brain or the mind, if you will, is the only thing that studies itself, right? So, it's kind of like we can study our heart, our hands, and like it's the same thing in a sense, but it's separated in some sense. You know, not actually, but you get what I mean. Whereas this is literally thinking of itself, which I think is a block on the understanding you could have of it. Or it's an insight, I don't know. Um, I don't know, it can be a block.

Yeah, you're not radically honest with yourself.

Okay.

Oh, oh my God, and you're telling yourself then you're telling yourself stories, but those stories are false. If you're radically honest with yourself, then you are telling yourself stories still, but those stories are real. Now, what is the mind? Um, we're gonna say consciousness. What is consciousness? I like to use— because then, because what is it that we're doing. We're talking, so we are exchanging insights through code. Speech is code. Each word has its own meaning. Then together we organize words into sentences for a more complex or specific meaning. But those are representations. The words are real. The representations are real, but what we talk about, we're not having an experience of it. Let me give you an example. If we talk about silence right now, you and I, let's talk about silence. What is silence? What is silence to you? What is it useful? Is it good? What's the benefits of it, etc.? Okay, we're going to have all kinds of considerations, interpretations, representations, all about silence and around the value or, you know, the essence of silence. But the elephant in the room, we're not having an experience of silence. Okay, so consciousness, we can talk about consciousness and try to describe or define what it is, but I like to use that very simple word It's simple. It's experience. Hmm.

Okay.

So having an experience through consciousness, but it's being that experience through consciousness. That's the what. We all know we have it. We all know we are that experience in our own ways, individual ways. And also there is an overlap. There are things that are completely universal. So that we know about that. Where does it come from? What's the purpose of it? This can be also subject of very, very long conversations. Entire encyclopedias have been written about consciousness alone. But ultimately, what matters? It's not the definition. It's none of that. Ultimately, what really matters is Are we satisfied with the experience we are in this moment? That's it. Regardless of how the experience that we are is satisfying personally. Some people want to go to a rave party. Some people want to go to the gym. Some people want to be a writer. Some people want to be whatever. Some people want to have a lot of friends. Some people want to be a hermit, etc., etc. There are many ways to experience this experience that we are. And we all have experienced a variety of ways to experience ourselves and the experience that we are in many ways and be like, I don't like that experience of myself doing that, being that, being that place, being with those people, having that activity, being in that country, whatever it is, dressing like this, talking like that, being interested in this. This is not me anymore. And And then we try something else and we're like, nah, not anymore. Sometimes we are interested and then we become disinterested because we're past something. And ultimately, it's an elimination, like an elimination diet. It's an elimination process of experiences that we understand are not who we are. This is not the experience we want. We do not identify as a person being that, having that kind of experience. That is personal wisdom. Nobody can make you wise in the way that you want to be wise. And wisdom is not necessarily fathoming the highest, deepest, noblest insights. That's part of wisdom, but it's not all wisdom. Wisdom is just how to make yourself happy, how to make yourself satisfied. As often as possible with the experience that you are, that we call life. Life, it's— it can be gone just like that. So it's very important. We got to be wise about it, because otherwise we can just not enjoy it.

I agree. So, okay, so I want to— and this is where I normally start conversations, but you piqued my interest with some of your introduction. So When you were younger, did you think you'd be doing anything like that? I mean, like middle school, high school, did you see yourself doing any of this? And then the second part of that question is, what actually led you to this work? Because if I had to guess, and I could be wrong, but I feel like there's got to be some sort of story there of like you were doing something before, something happened, and then it led you to helping others with this type of work.

Um, so either way, I think it's all of that. In truth, I do remember being 4 years old at school, in the school, schoolyard, and sometimes, of course, I would play with all the kids. But that one time I sat back on my own for a long time. I wanted to be on my own, and I looked at them all of them playing. And I thought to myself, and I don't know exactly what words, how my thoughts were formulated, but I do remember what I was thinking. One, they are in the moment, but they don't see themselves. They don't see themselves being what they are right now. Of course, I mean, they're kids. I mean, I'm a kid, I'm 4 years old. I'm not like, come on, I'm not 50 or 70 by then. And thinking I'm different, I'm not the same. I think what I was realizing is, okay, there's a path to life that also has to do with what's called introspection or consciousness awareness. And to have that awareness, sometimes you need to detach from being exclusively absorbed in what it is that you're doing, which by the way, kids are the best at being caught in the moment, which is their innocence, which is beautiful. But it feels like I had an insight already, an intuition about that I was going to be on that path of, you know, like you said, what is the mind, the mind observing itself, the mind having the ability of observing itself. That's what we do when we meditate, right? Which is that instead of being caught, that intention is only directed towards external objects or subjects. All of a sudden it directs back onto itself, and then it's looking at itself. And so it's only from there from that standpoint, from that point, from that, uh, mode that you can start to tweak yourself. Number 1 is observation. Number 2 is, okay, decide what is it that you're satisfied with and what is it that you would like to improve. Okay, um, this being said, now, for a long time I didn't know what I wanted to do. I left school, I left I went to university a bit and that really wasn't for me. I quit. It's not that I was not smart enough. In fact, back then we had a mandatory French, like a military service in France, one whole year. And when, so you had to go pass the test and stuff. They wanted me to be a, they wanted to enroll me in the officer academy based on my IQ test. And I said, no, thank you, I'm not interested. And in fact, they sent— then they sent me to Germany, and then I was out within a week. I was out because I made them understand, look, you're not going to keep me, no way. But normally they would send you in prison if you tried to do that. But I just had a smart way to just be— just, just let me go. It's better for everybody.

Yes.

Don't waste your time on me, because if you do, you are going to be wasting a lot of time.

I love that.

This is not my place, okay? You got to know what you want in your life. But back then, I still didn't want— didn't know what I wanted. I really had no clue how to professionally, um, use my, uh, whatever I— there were You know, I was not interested. Then here's the thing, I, from very early on, again, back to childhood, because childhood is so defining of who we are. We all know that, like, all of us, we have our childhood stories and those moments where we're like, oh, okay, they were pivotal in what we later on became because of something. Some, some, it's not always something that happened to us. Sometimes just realizations that We had like epiphanies, insights about ourselves. Mine was adults are boring. They look, they look like boring to me. They don't move. They always want to talk. I don't want that life. I don't want a life of, I don't want to work in an office. I don't want, and it's fine. I mean, there are people who have all kinds of jobs and we need all these jobs for a society and to function. But I knew none of those jobs were for me because it just wasn't me. I also knew that I would hate to work for somebody. So I had to find a creative way to have my own professional activity that would be completely mine and that would make sense. And it took me a long time to find that and to elaborate that. So when I was a kid, I was moving in nature a lot. I was playing in the woods, climbing trees, climbing rocks, jumping from rock to rocks. I was lucky that I lived close to nature. And not only that, but I was pushed by my dad and my mom. Go out, go out, go out. Don't watch TV, just go out, go play outside. Very privileged that way. Yeah. And later on, I realized We need people to do that. We need people to do that. And I realized it was the, that's the way that physical exercise was done for a long part. But most of the history of physical education, people were just doing those things. They were running, jumping, balancing, crawling, moving heavy things, vaulting over obstacles, climbing ropes, uh, training with weapons. Horse riding, all kind of things, all natural movement things. And I came to the realization that it was missing in today's society, and I appointed myself, you'll be the one to bring this to the world. Who am I? I'm a guy in his mid-30s. I have no experience, especially like specifically in that field, except my personal training for years. And in fact, I know a lot, but aside from that, nobody knows me. I don't have like the regular credentials, and yet I made it happen. As for the breath-holding meditation, that's also— it's a whole story of, uh, I did it when I was a kid. My grandpa did it. Um, oh wow, I almost drowned when I was a kid, and then I like— 3 times. Um, yes, then, uh, I enjoyed spearfishing, and I've always been— I was always interested in all kinds of weird things when I was a young adult, you know, like astral projections, sophrology, energies, telepathy, automatic writing, you name it, I tried it all. I was drawn to all these things. Today what I teach is like absolutely— there's no woohoo, hoopla in it. It's just very straightforward. But by learning to hold my breath longer, I taught myself how to master my inner experience. This is what I teach, what I had to do with my mind to hold my breath longer, to make the experience that is known as being extremely unpleasant— that's the least we can say of holding your breath a long time. How do you make it less unpleasant or even nearly pleasant? It's possible. Yeah, I had to learn by observation, by experimentation, how to do that. So I haven't learned pranayama, never learned that. My first breathwork teacher, in fact, was when I was 7 years old. So I'm 51 now, it's a long time ago. My clarinet teacher taught me diaphragmatic breathing and breath control so I could play the clarinet well. It's not the, the notes and the finger placement that you need to control first, it's the breath. And then you play the clarinet, you practice every day for half hour to an hour a day. That's a lot of breathwork practice. You become an expert. Oh yeah.

Oh, of course. Yeah, no, I mean, I, um, it's so interesting how the breathwork— uh, so there's a couple things here, right? I'm sure, um, you've heard of, uh, like doing ice baths and stuff and like the Wim Hof stuff and all that.

Tyler, Taylor, Taylor, okay, I'm gonna tell you because I'm gonna have to be a storyteller here, right? My life is really completely unlike any We will have a life that is unique, that's for sure. But my life is unique in a way that's also very unique. And part of that also is from 19 to 26, I had some kind of a guru, some kind of a guy who was an older guy, and he taught me a number of things, a lot of things. And I embraced his teaching and the lifestyle that he was advocating. Like, with complete education, what did that entail? Every single aspect that is now known as rewelding, biohacking, you name it, I did back then. Age 19, starting age 19. I was born in 1971, so starting in 1990, that's before the internet, or before the internet be— become, became mainstream. Yeah, that's before smartphones. That's before personal computers became completely mainstream like they are now. So there is no photos and videos of that. There's no, there was no Instagram and stuff like that didn't exist. But what is it that I did? Fasting, known as intermittent fasting today, as if you were to As opposed to what? Continuous fasting, like fasting all the time? I mean, hello, fasting is obviously intermittent. Yeah, it's not like you can do it all the time, right?

I never thought of that.

I know, I know. I mean, forever in all ancient religions and stuff, it's been called fasting.

That's so funny.

Now you have to say intermittent fasting. What do you mean? Yeah, it's because like you stop eating, but then you eat again. Then you— so you fasting, you do only intermittently, like you don't starve yourself to death. Well, thanks for, uh, reassuring me. Of course, so fasting was part of that. So that was—

that's brilliant.

It's like if I was to talk— to call, uh, breath holding intermittent breathing or intermittent breath holding as opposed to what, continuous breath holding? Okay. You'll be dead in 5, 10 minutes from now. Uh, you'll be brain dead. Um, so thanks for trying the experiment. You learn from it, you know. Sometimes, yeah, because like they want today, they want to make everything flashy and different and this and that. Okay, cold exposure, cold plunging was part of it. As a matter of fact, that guy I talked about, my mentor, he has a book On the book cover, you see him jumping off from a helicopter, and what's in the background? Freaking massive iceberg. And he doesn't have a wetsuit. Yeah, so we were practicing cold plunging, typically at night in Paris, um, having to break the ice, and we would do that all the time. Cold showers. We did it, what's called, known as earthing or grounding. All our trainings were barefoot. So barefoot, barefoot movement, all movements, natural movements. So parkour, before parkour, jumping off things, climbing on scaffoldings, because it's all urban. We live in Paris. So we live in Paris and we're like, it's polluted, It's crowded, it's unnatural, it's artificial. How can we live healthily there? How can we go against the machine without the rage, just being constructive? Well, you need a discipline, you need a lifestyle, you need to understand nature and the nature in you. So you do a lot of breathing exercises, breathing exercises every day. Fasting once a week or twice a week, fasting actually every day, in fact, because of eating typically only one meal or two meals a day at the most, eating all organic, all cooked at home, no processed food, um, vegetarian, sometimes a bit of meat or fish, but mostly, uh, potatoes, cheese, eggs, whatever. So there was the nutrition The breathing every day, the movement practice every day, the grounding because barefoot practice, the cold exposure because cold showers pretty much every day and cold immersions in the winter all the time. I mean, what else is missing from there? Oh, we would sleep on sheepskins or with full blankets, like super hard just for discipline. For— it was a form of asceticism, stoicism. Always dressed like— no jewelry, always dressed in black, long hair, like a kind of a— just a whole lifestyle. And truly, today, by the way, uh, this is what a lot of people need. They would need that for at least a solid year to teach them discipline, self-discipline, what a healthy lifestyle really is. And so it wasn't— all these things weren't, weren't turned into a niche like they are today. Yeah, there was no quantum physics, quantum medicine explanations for any of that, no scientific explanation of it. It was all like very organic, very intuitive. But that's my, my background. So if you're asking me how did that came to you? Well, it was what was completely essential to my life. It wasn't a professional career, it was not a romantic relationship back then, and have children or anything. It was just the inner work, the work on self, both the work on the mind, because it takes, again, a lot of awareness, a lot of self-discipline, a lot of commitment, because you're seen as like asocial, right? Like, hey, friends are like, hey, why don't you come with us and go Play a good party, get drunk, stuff like, no, but why? Because I don't drink a single drop of alcohol. How you want that? You know, don't you want this? And now we're going to have a meal. It's going to be no, because I don't eat a drop. I don't eat an ounce of sugar, not even nothing, no sugar at all. And sorry, not any of that junk food. Thank you. If you want to turn into zombie when you're 40 years old, 50 years old, 60, or even now, as a matter of fact. And that's your lifestyle and that's your choice, but I'm on a completely different path. No explanation to be given, just commitment. You, you see your choices, your results. I see my choices, I see my results. Eventually I realized that everything that I have lived and experimented on and experienced and learned, I could turn it into a method that would inspire people to become healthy again in their mind, in the body. And that led me to the creation of Move Nat, the concept of natural movement and Move Nat as a lifestyle. And today I'm bringing this even a little further because it's really about, okay, lifestyle is great, all this is very important. Let's specifically address the mind, because there's— there can be such a mess in a person's mind, so much confusion, frustration. And a lot of people know that, they don't know how to sort it out and how to reorganize inside. And telling them, oh, just relax or meditate, which means try to not think, or just observe your thinking, doesn't cut it. It doesn't work for them. Yeah. So I've been working on a novel way and more effective ways to make it work for people.

Well, in a sense, what's interesting is it's kind of come full circle, um, and that was incredible explanation there. But what I mean is it all kind of leads back to the mind, meaning I think a lot of people, their mind isn't right Due to everything you just said, most people in today's world are doing the opposite. So they're taking warm shower, warm bath, they are eating sugar, they are not exercising. They're doing the opposite of everything that you did from 19 to 25 or 26. I'm assuming you still continue to do most of it. Maybe it's not as rigorous, or maybe you're sleeping on a better mattress now. I don't, you know, maybe not. I don't know. Okay, I won't tell anybody. We'll cut that out.

No, I mean, it's exactly— and you know, some, um, some experiences are not meant to last. Yes, you need— you just need to go through them so you just learn what you have to learn, then move on, move on to the next, uh, learning experience.

Yeah.

Um, can I make myself comfortable in discomfort? Absolutely. Actually, I do it every day when I hold my breath for a long time. That is discomfort. I'm facing discomfort. That ability to have commitment and at the same time composure, relaxation, trust, all qualities of the mind that are essential in fact pretty much any situation of life, but that you must display for that kind of practice. Cold exposure, breath holding. But if you go running, if you're not a runner, or if you're a runner but you go push yourself, it's the same thing. It's always the same idea. You strategically, intentionally expose yourself to discomfort to learn what? To become more comfortable, to have more wellpower, more patience, more endurance of the body, more endurance of the mind, more resiliency of the body, more resiliency of the mind, etc. Why do you do that? Well, because on a day-to-day basis, we have so much comfort. Nobody's going to starve. I mean, you're not getting— pretty much you're going to eat whenever you want, as much as you want, given the kind of exact kind of food you want. That's comfort. You will sleep in a place that's typically silent, comfortable, at the right temperature, the kind of mattress you want. You will dress in comfortable clothes, um, etc., etc., etc. You'll sit most of the day. This is amazing comfort. This is a level, kind of, kind of level comfort that very few humans before us have experienced. What does that do to us, both good and bad? Good, because we all need comfort. Look at— you have a dog, you let them sit on your couch, next thing you know, if you say like, no, no, get down, you're not allowed anymore, they're going to growl at you because it's not— it has become their fundamental dog right of sitting and living on the couch. It's not your couch anymore, it's theirs. See what I mean? They love comfort. If you feed a dog all day with all kinds of food, they'll eat it all. They won't be like, nah, is this keto? What are the micro and macronutrients in that and this and that? They won't. They just eat it all. They'll eat it up. And then they sleep all day and play whenever they want. And then they sleep in your bed if they can too. Okay, you let them, they'll get all the comfort they want. And then what happens to the dog? Becomes unhealthy, fat, has to go to the, to the veterinary, uh, more often, all kind of health issues. Because the same is happening to them. They are domesticated, they are so comfortable that they become uncomfortable. Because too much comfort.

That's what I was going to say.

Comfort matters. Nobody wants to be uncomfortable all day, every day. That's not sustainable. Comfort is good, but you need to strategically generate enough discomfort in your life a bit every day for two reasons. One, for homeostasis. To maintain your ability, the ability of your body, your physiology, and your mind, your nervous system to handle stress, to compensate for not being challenged enough because of all that comfort, because that makes you weak. And number 3, and maybe not the most important, but definitely extremely important, Gratefulness, it's for appreciation. When you run, you're not on your couch, you're on your legs, your heart is beating, your lungs are burning. I don't know, maybe you're pushing yourself a bit. You're like, wow, when I can sit and relax, I can really enjoy the comfort. Thank you, wonderful. When you fast and you get hungry and you start to think of the food, the next meal, it's not there yet because you have self-discipline, you start to think, wow, that food is gonna taste so good, it's gonna nourish my body so good, I'm so grateful, thank you, thank you that I have food every day. When you hold your breath, or if you don't know what to be grateful for, hold your breath for a minute.

Yeah, so true.

Wow, I have an able body and I can breathe. I don't have breathing issues. I don't have respiratory issues. I can breathe freely. Thank you, breath. Thank you, body. And thank you, life. Because you know that if you keep holding your breath, then you die. Obviously, everybody knows that. We know that since we're kids. So when you hold your breath, you remember right away, oh, I'm alive. Yeah, that breath, all of these breaths are so precious. Those reminders are important because otherwise all we do all day is to cultivate and entertain frustration. Oh, I don't have that, I need that, I don't have that, that's not enough. You see lack, you see deficiency, you're frustrated, you go after things. It's okay, we all need to do that. It's okay to pursue better, fine, totally fine, totally legitimate. But if we're going to be in that mindset the whole time, every day, we means that we're always going to be in frustration at some point. Because even when we reach our objectives, then we forget that we have already reached them. We're already focused on what's next. And the satisfaction that we have already reached a certain level of comfort or income, whatever it is, we did not really appreciate it. We did not magnify it. We, we did not celebrate it, maybe, because we're always like, more, more, more. I still lack. It's not enough. So the simple idea— and it's not just an idea, it's a practice. It's not just an insight to entertain, oh, that's an interesting idea. It's like, it's something to be practiced. Is by depriving myself of something, by making myself lacking something essential for a moment, few minutes if it's a breath hold, few hours if it's not eating, fasting. Intermittently. By doing that, we cultivate appreciation. So that's the antidote to continuous frustration because I can't get no satisfaction. Why? Why is that missing? You have a job or you have income, you have a house, you have food, you have friends, you have health, you have everything. Well, all you look at is, you know, the empty half of the glass. You never really take a close look at the half-full part of a glass to just even smell it and appreciate it, sipping, so good. I have all of that. And if I had just that, I'm set, I'm golden. That alone is enough. And when you do that with your external circumstances, what you have, that's good. When sometimes you can do that with what you do and who you are and just say, I have enough, I do enough, and I am enough. It's the most beautiful gift to relieve your mind from completely, you know, over-pressurizing yourself all the time, putting yourself under the pressure of performance, the pressure of expectation, the pressure of everything. You know, you can destroy your happiness by always being in a hot pursuit of happiness when it's right there before your eyes.

Yeah, I think one of the biggest lessons from that is like, you can literally be so comfortable that you become uncomfortable with like normal comfort. Meaning like, if you sit and watch like Netflix all day for 10 hours, the first hour or two is pleasurable, but then you can become miserable in the last 8 hours. And It's just because like, I don't even, we're not even like built to be like that to begin with. But I'm just saying, it's like you need that. It's almost like everything's the opposite. It's like, okay, it, I, I like to, I'm a big Alan Watts fan. Um, I, I feel like you maybe know of Alan Watts, probably. Um, yeah, yeah. I love that guy.

I've heard of him.

Okay. Yeah. So What I would say is that like, everything's kind of a reflection, right? So what I'm about to say, I would never like wish this on, I would never wish anything negative on anybody. But like, I think this is an interesting concept of like, if you, if you go through really difficult times, like if something really bad happens in your life, or let's just use this, say if you went to prison for 10 years, after you get out of prison for 10 years, life's gonna look a little different, right? Like it's gonna look a little shinier outside. Like things are gonna be a little more vibrant because it's a reflector. Like life, a lot of times if you want something, you have to experience the opposite, right? Because if we were happy all the time, you wouldn't even know what happiness is. Cause it would just be this dull, neutral feeling. So, and that's what you're saying is like, you're not saying go to prison for 10 years, but what you're saying is, you know, maybe run for 10 minutes, you know, and then sit on this.

Yes, but in truth, in truth, Tyler, we don't need to wish anyone anything because first off, it's gonna be everybody's cards and it's going to be everybody's life. And you can be sure, it's guaranteed, it doesn't matter your deck, there's gonna be some bad cards in it, there's gonna be some there's gonna be some suffering in there for you, for everyone. You show me anyone who's never been through some tough time, it does not exist. You show me anyone who hasn't had trauma in their life, that does not exist. So that's a universal condition for all of us. Yeah, as we're alive, we're gonna have to deal with some challenging circumstances at some point.

Agreed.

The question is, when we do, do we learn from it or not? And what is it that we learn? And what we learn, when we do learn it, is it something that is just an insight that then we forget, and so we repeat the same experience in the same behaviors that are just not pleasant, not reproductive? Or does that learning become something that we really pay attention to continuously? It becomes part of a new version of who we are, so we don't have, we don't have to remind ourselves at some point. Lesson is learned. One of them is appreciation and therefore gratefulness every day. Well, I don't know, personally the way I practice appreciation is, first off, I don't tell myself, okay, at 11 AM I have 10 minutes of appreciation practice. It's not the way it works. It just, it flows out of me because I've learned to practice it without practicing. It has become part of me. What am I talking about? I eat my food with appreciation. It's like sometimes, yeah, sometimes I also look at a show or something, some work when I eat, but most of the time I'll just, yeah, give grace for my food before I eat it. I'll smell it. First off, I cook it myself most of the time. I remember where every ingredients come from. I acknowledge that, oh, it was grown. Oh, it was an animal that was alive somewhere. Oh, some people put the work so that I can have that food on my plate. Oh, it smells good. Oh, it looks good. Oh, it tastes good. Oh, I like the way it feels when I eat it. And then I feel satisfied and more thank you. You know, a simple thank you or many thank yous can go a long way. It's appreciation. If you just eat and drink and sleep and just appreciate— well, not appreciate, but consume all the conveniences, all the comforts, all the resources and just say, well, yeah, whatever, you know, I worked for it, so therefore I paid for it, therefore I earn it and all. No, just no, no, no, put that— no, no, put that on the side. Wait, just doesn't matter if that you paid for it, that you work for it, we all did. Okay, just— and that's me sharing in an advice, sharing insight. Just remember where everything comes from. When you put a clean shirt on or something God, you didn't have to manufacture that shirt, you didn't have to even wash that shirt because it was washed by a machine with water that just flows into your machine. You just had to press on the button, right? All these conveniences, and there are so many. Just driving a car, well, there's traffic, it's not the nicest, and so what? You want to be on your feet? You want to be without a car? See the difference, right? Yeah, but my body is not really perfect. And so what? Do you prefer to be in a wheelchair, on a bed, and you can't move? Appreciate what you've got and what you can experience and enjoy in this moment, because you don't know for how long you will experience it. Your health— you can have an accident or a disease overnight. Your life is transformed. The people you love, you can lose them overnight. Your job, everything, same thing. Everything can be turned upside down anytime. Appreciation for what you have, because ultimately this experience that we are is gone, but we're in the game. So appreciation for just being alive, just breathing, just having freedom. Just— what do you mean freedom? Well, freedom, freedom. Today there are plenty of things you can do, there are plenty of things you can imagine, decisions you can make. You may not change everything overnight, but you have the ability to organize yourself to change and improve your circumstances. That's a lot of freedom. Not everybody in this world has that freedom. So there's so much, it's almost overwhelming how much there is for us to appreciate and be grateful for. But if we don't do it, then all we spend our time is in frustration, not in satisfaction. That's the problem. It's not, it's not because anything is missing. It's mostly because what's lacking is our acknowledgement of everything that is there. And again, not just externally, just us, just being alive, just being in the game. That's the practice that I strongly recommend, just to make yourself happy.

100%. Yeah. I mean, and it's awareness too. And I think too, sometimes what it is, there is so many kind of things going on at once that the default is to not do anything, right? To not realize anything. And, you know, cuz when there's so many things going on, the brain gets tired and shuts down. Like, we're gonna have to do a part 2. Here's what I wanna do.

Yes.

So here's what I wanna do. And this is actually a good cliffhanger cuz I have a good question. I'll ask you when we do another. But here's what I'm gonna do. Let me leave the floor to you. Is there anything we didn't cover that you want to share and let people know how to stay in contact with you, like social medias, website, and anything you have?

I think it's complete. Part 1 complete. And I think we did a great job. I know it may sound all philosophical and all. Actually, if you, if you look at it a little closely, it's 100% effective and it's completely actionable. You just need to practice it like practice your appreciation. And then there are many other tools for the mind. But look, when it comes to the mind, the mind needs to be practiced too. It's just like being a gardener of a garden. You don't expect growth and beautiful flowers and tasty vegetables right away, just, you know, after a few sessions. Even though sometimes you can have great insights and epiphanies, and it can be just one insight, if it's really absorbed and understood, that can be life-changing. But yeah, it all starts with the mind. You said that, and that is true, because ultimately everything that we do, everything that we have, everything that we experience, it's experience from within first. What we call life, it's just that experience that we perceive from within, from inside, from the mind. So there is the gold, but it's also potentially the lead of gold. So you gotta learn to master your inner experience to become an alchemist of who you are. That's what it is. It's practice. It's a process. It's not just, uh, oh, I read one self-help book and my life is transformed. People can find me on movnat.com. It's M-O-V-N-A-T dot com. That's for the natural movement fitness, and also it's about health and well-being. Uh, and then there is breathholdwork.com. So breathwork, it's, um, Breathwork, breathing exercises, breathwork practice, breath-hold work, breath-holding practice. But most importantly, it's a meditation. It's what happens not just to the body, but also to the nervous system, and therefore also to the mental self and the emotional self as we practice this. And last words, it's not just, oh, if I practice this, this will happen to my mind or to my nervous system. It's not just what happens to your mind, it's what do you want your mind to make happen to itself. That is the question. And when you're focused on that, it's— you're doing that not just when you meditate, you're doing that at every moment that you are conscious in your life, because you pay attention to how you want your experience to be.